Author's note: I do not Kvothe or Denna. That incomparable honour goes to Patrick Rothfuss. I just hope that I can do them justice.
"Who knows what I deserve?" she said. "He's not my best loaf. He's it. Him or hungry."
"You have other options," I said, then stalled, thinking of my conversation with Deoch. "You've… you've got…"
"I've got you," she said dreamily. I could hear the warm, sleepy smile in her voice, like a child tucked into bed. "Will you be my dark-eyed Prince Gallant and protect me from pigs? Sing to me? Whisk me away to tall trees. ..." she trailed off to nothing.
I didn't know what to say to that. I wanted to say yes. I almost did. It would even have been a good time for it, with her in my arms. But I thought that far and away the most likely result would involve her laughing in my face. She would be perfectly justified in doing so, too.
Fortunately, I was saved from having to answer when she spoke again. "You looked so pretty."
Again, I didn't know how to respond to that, but for entirely different reasons. I have been called many things in my life, but pretty has never been among them. I put it down to delirium.
However, although I could feel her drifting off to sleep as the resin took its course, I couldn't help but want to keep talking to her. It takes a special sort of person to lie with his arms wrapped a beautiful woman and think only of talking, but I didn't dare think of anything else. I wasn't sure I even could, even knowing that the draccus was coming. So I said "When?"
"When I met you. Your hair was fiery, but you weren't. You were like a kitten, or something."
"How?" I said, wondering whether I was being complimented or insulted.
"How what?" she said slowly. She seemed barely awake now.
"Never mind."
"Then you played, and I remembered laughter and rain on a tin roof… all kinds of things. I thought you were like me, then."
My breath caught. Denna and I had never talked about anything truly serious. It wasn't that we actively avoided it, it just wasn't something that we ever did. We were both private people.
"Tehlu anyway, I must have cried for a solid span after you played that day." Denna said. Although she still sounded as though she was more asleep than awake, there was something, some mournful tone colouring her voice.
"I'm sorry." I said, for want of anything better to say.
"Don't be. I've seen… lots of things. A handful are beautiful. I never saw anything as beautiful as you spinning a song like a spider's masterpiece."
For a few seconds, I was sure that I wasn't able to speak. I felt like I was a hairsbreadth from crying, which, let me assure you, is no common occurrence. So it took me entirely by surprise when I found myself speaking. "Your Aloine… it was… bewitching. I grew up with musicians, and I don't know that I ever heard anything like that before. It wasn't just that you were singing her part, you were her."
"You say the kindest things." She said softly, the words barely leaving her lips.
"It's not kindness. It's the truth."
"I wonder what would've happened if you had come with me. To Annilin, or wherever. With music like that…" she trailed off, and I thought she had finally slipped into slumber.
"I've thought about it too." I said, for only the wind to hear.
"That isn't seven words." Although the words weren't loud, when Denna spoke I flinched in surprise. She shifted with me but didn't otherwise stir. "Try again. You'll get it right someday. Get it right again someday."
I didn't know what to make of that, but I was saved from trying to cobble together a coherent statement when she said "I think I would've remembered you even if it weren't for your music."
"I remembered you." I whispered sometime later, knowing full well that she had gone through the doors of sleep and couldn't hear me anyway.